The present invention relates to a color-image recording apparatus employing a liquid crystal device used, for example, as a liquid crystal light shutter. More particularly, the invention relates to a color-image recording apparatus employing a liquid crystal device arranged to modulate the quantity of transmitted or reflected light by controlling the magnitude and/or application time or the frequency of a voltage applied to a liquid crystal.
Conventionally, a technique has been employed in which a light image is recorded on a photosensitive material using a liquid crystal shutter device in which liquid crystal devices are, for example, linearly arranged. FIG. 1 shows the structure and illustrates the mode of recording with such a liquid crystal shutter array. A parallel light beam is on/off controlled by a liquid crystal shutter array 10 driven with a picture signal. The light beam on/off controlled in accordance with the image or picture signal by the liquid crystal shutter array 10 is focused on a light-transmitting condenser array, for example, a Selfoc-lens array 2, so that a photosensitive material 3 is exposed to the image. ("Selfoc" is a trade name of Nippon Sheet Glass Co., Ltd., and a Selfoc lens is a refractory distribution type lens.) The liquid crystal shutter array 10 is provided with a pair of orientation films 12A and 12B disposed in opposition to each other with a gap of a predetermined distance (for example, 6.mu.) therebetween filled with a liquid crystal 11.
Transparent pixel electrodes 13 defining the picture elements or pixels of the shutter array are embedded in the orientation film 12B, and light-intercepting photomasks are embedded in the other orientation film 12A aligned with the respective pixel electrodes 13. A transparent common electrode 14 is provided on the outside of the orientation film 12A. A layer of transparent substrate 15B of glass or the like is provided on the outside of the orientation film 12B, a layer of a transparent substrate 15A having substantially the same thickness as that of the transparent substrate 15B is provided on the outside of the common electrode 14B, and polarization plates 16A and 16B are stacked on the respective outsides of the transparent substrates 15A and 15B.
The parallel light beam 1 incident on the liquid crystal shutter array 10 reaches the pixel electrodes 13 in the above-described manner. Accordingly, by electrically controlling the pixel electrodes 13 and the common electrode 14 opposing the pixel electrodes 13, the light beam is shutter-controlled in cooperation with the photomasks 17. The light transmitted through the position of each of the pixel electrodes 13 in the liquid crystal shutter array 10 is focused by the Selfoc lens array 2 on the photosensitive material 3 so that the photosensitive material 3 is exposed to the transmitted and focused light beam to thereby optically record a picture.
In FIG. 1, generally, the parallel light beam 1 is not completely parallel, and therefore in the illustrated example the incident angle is made very large.
An apparatus for recording using separate liquid crystal shutter arrays as described above for each of three primary colors, namely, R (red), G (green) and B (blue), and in which recording is carried out line-by-line successively in the order of, for instance, R, G and B, is disclosed, for example, in Japanese Unexamined Patent Application Publication No. 186953/1982. Moreover, a color picture recording apparatus in which a cylindrical color filter of the three primary colors R, G and B is provided between the liquid crystal shutter array 10 and the photosensitive material 3 and wherein recording is effected by rotating the color filter through the respective R, G and B positions, is disclosed, for example, in Japanese Unexamined Patent Application Publication No. 275224/1984. In both of these recording apparatuses, there is a disadvantage in that the apparatus is large in size and employs complicated operations.